Pasta in a terracotta pot (and a recipe)

My childhood masterstroke

Writing recipes is a tricky business, I reckon.

What does a "pinch of salt" mean? How heaped is a "heaped cup of flour?" What constitutes a "generous handful of coriander, leaves and stems"? How much salt and pepper "to taste" will make the dish actually taste as it's meant to?

Don't even start me on the accuracy of oven temperature gauges. Or the difference in cooking times for gas vs electric stovetops.

Trickiness aside, I've always fancied myself a career as Professional Recipe Writer.

I began pursuing this career in around 1998. It began with copying recipes from the Edmond's Cookbook on pieces of that colourful memo cube paper that people used to have beside their landlines at my grandparents', Bob and Wendy's place. At my other grandparents' Kate and Kink's place I copied recipes from Jo Seager and Nigel Slater cookbooks onto memo cube paper printed with local government insurance company branding. The beginnings of both my Recipe Writing Career and my career in local government.

I then graduated to copying recipes into a 1B5 exercise book. Mostly baking recipes, and mostly recipes from either the Edmond's Cookbook, or a cookbook of Alison Holst's best muffin and slice recipes. I still have that 1B5, and I still use it religiously.

Though before the 1B5 era I was much more modern. Instead of slavishly copying recipes in my best convent schoolgirl handwriting, I furiously typed them and shared them via a Matmice blog (who remembers Matmice!?) I called it "Gracie the Dancing Chef". I was obviously trying to channel Jamie Oliver and obviously thought I was good at dancing. Both amusing. I shared a lot of Donna Hay recipes on that blog from memory.

And I shared handwritten and typed out copies of recipes with my childhood neighbour Alex. We used to post them to one another through the door that separated the houses our families lived in at New Plymouth Boys' High School, where our dads were boarding masters. About a year ago Alex sent me a clear file of all the recipes and letters I'd posted her, and that she'd kept for all of these years. There were some real treasures. E.G. Smiley Face Bread that utilised grated cheese and red capsicum and frankfurters, and a recipe for creamy potato salad that I annotated with a note, "A FAVOURITE AT BBQS AND PICNICS_YOU'D BETTER GET TO IT BEFORE EVERYONE ELSE DOES!!".

Yes, it's not untrue that my Recipe Writing Career consists mostly of copying out others' recipes, rather than penning my own. I told you this was a tricky business. (Though I reckon that Smiley Face Bread reeks of me and the sort of recipe I'd write).

Later in life I took to sharing other peoples' recipes in the email newsletter called Stay at Home and Cook that I wrote and sent during consecutive Covid-19 lockdowns. I penned a few of my own recipes too. Though calling them "recipes" is probably a stretch. Loose guidelines on how to whip something together is probably more accurate. And so, unsurprisingly, they were probably more difficult to follow than the already difficult to follow recipes crafted by the experts; the professional Recipe Writing Careerists.

But my career highlight, and I absolutely stand by this, was a recipe I wrote aged 9 entitled, "Chicken Pasta Terracotta Pots".

This, dear readers, was not just what it said on the tin, but very stylish and ahead of its time. I lie, food served in a terracotta pot, and a dish involving pesto, is as quintessential early 2000s as it gets.

The recipe went something along the lines of cooking onion and garlic and chicken pieces "in marg" (good God), tossing it and some cooked penne pasta through pesto, and, for the showstopper bit, serving it in a terracotta pot, finished with a smattering of "grated cheese, parmesan is good". At least I didn't suggest Edam.

I'm not sure that this recipe gained quite the cult following of say Alison Roman's "The Stew" or Nigella's Chocolate Guinness Cake, but, as I've said, career highlight. Finest work. All of that.

I'm still a bit footloose and fancy free when it comes to penning recipes. Which reflects my preferred approach to cooking. I'm less a slave to a recipe than an inventor of combinations from the contents of the fridge. But I do like to share slightly haphazard instructions for the things I create that are particularly good. And so, with that in mind, here's a little recipe (loose guidelines) for a very good sausage ragu with gnocchi. We had it for tonight with glasses of the last of the rosé and a salad made from the last of what's in the fridge (we go away this week for a few weeks).

Serving the gnocchi in a terracotta pot is optional.


Sausage and gnocchi ragu

- Dice a medium sized onion, and thinly slice three - four medium sized cloves of garlic.

- Heat a couple of splashes of olive oil in a large heavy based pan. Add the onion, and cook until soft. Then add the garlic and cook for a couple of minutes. Season with salt and pepper as you go.

- Remove from the skins the meat of a packet of Woody's Free Range pork sausages with Zany Zeus feta. Roughly break the meat up and add it to the pan. Add a splash of water, season with salt and pepper. Cook until starting to take on some colour. (Note, it's really the Zany Zeus feta sausages that make this dish).

- Add a medium sized pinch (you guess what that means) of whole fennel seeds. Toast for a minute. You could crush them slightly if you want.

- Add a tin of whole tomatoes and their juices, crushing the tomatoes with your hands as you add them to the pan. Half fill the empty tin with water, slosh it round and add this to the pan. Season with salt and pepper.

- Leave to cook for about 20 - 25 minutes until some of the liquid has evaporated and the tomatoes look nice and red. Season to taste (you do you).

- In a separate pan bring some water to the boil. Make sure it's well salted. Once boiling, add store bought gnocchi. I really like the mini gnocchi that Molisana brand make. Cook according to packet instructions.

- Remove the cooked gnocchi using a slotted spoon and add it to the pan of sausage ragu. Toss to coat, adding a few spoons of the pasta water to loosen things up initially and then bring everything together eventually.

- Serve in hot bowls (always hot bowls for pasta) with a good dowsing of freshly grated parm and heaps of cracked black pepper.